Post by BykerWhat If, in World War II, Japan Got the Atomic Bomb First? A
controversial book
about Japan’s race to build an atomic weapon in 1945 is published there
for the
first time. It also raises questions about how North Korea finally
got a
https://www.thedailybeast.com/in-world-war-ii-what-if-japan-got-the-atomic-bomb-first?ref=home
"After the war ended, intelligence officials learned that the Japanese
military,
just prior to their surrender, had actually developed and successfully
test-
fired an atomic device. The project had been housed in or near Konan (the
Japanese name for Hungnam), on the coast in the northern part of the
peninsula.
To make matters worse, by the end of 1945 the Soviets—who did not yet have
an
atomic bomb—had occupied much of Korea north of the 38th parallel and the
plant
where the Japanese atom bomb had been developed was under their control."
Sounds like BS, anyone out there know more about the Japanese A-Bomb
program?
https://www.latimes.com/world/asia/la-fg-japan-bomb-20150805-story.html
https://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/new-documents-found-pointing-to-japanese-atomic-bomb-pr-1722338915
There is NO evidence of any test firing of a device.
All that is sensationalized distortions.
Japan did have a fairly serious effort, but in terms of
what was needed to succeed, very tiny project.
This wiki seems fair and accurate.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_nuclear_weapon_program
I will cut & past one section,
" Lieutenant-General Takeo Yasuda on a train. Yasuda was at the
time director of the Army Aeronautical Department's Technical
Research Institute. Nishina told Yasuda about the possibility
of building nuclear weapons.[10] However, the Japanese fission
project did not formally begin until April 1941 when Yasuda acted
on Army Minister Hideki Tōjō's order to investigate the possibilities
of nuclear weapons. Yasuda passed the order down the chain of command
to Viscount Masatoshi Ōkōchi, director of the RIKEN Institute, who
in turn passed it to Nishina, whose Nuclear Research Laboratory by
1941 had over 100 researchers.[11]
Meanwhile, the Imperial Japanese Navy's Technology Research
Institute had been pursuing its own separate investigations,
and had engaged professors from the Imperial University, Tokyo,
for advice on nuclear weapons. This resulted in the formation of
the Committee on Research in the Application of Nuclear Physics,
chaired by Nishina, that met ten times between July 1942 and March
1943. It concluded in a report that while an atomic bomb was, in
principle, feasible, "it would probably be difficult even for the
United States to realize the application of atomic power during
the war". This caused the Navy to lose interest and to concentrate
instead on research into radar.[11]"
It was really very far beyond their industrial capacity.
But they, the Army, pushed on with a small project, but
that was destroyed in March 1945 Tokyo firebombing.
But it was because of their own research, they were quick
to understand what had happened at Hiroshima, and Nagasaki.